Perspectives and Provocations in Early Childhood Education

Edited by:
Vivian Vasquez, American University
Jeffrey Wood, Laurentian University

A volume in the series: Early Childhood Education Assembly. Editor(s): Alice Shawen.

Published 2013

Mandates to implement practices that are antithetical to what we embrace as supportive of young children’s literacy learning are pervasive. Teachers of young children are asked to teach-to-the test in ways that take away opportunities for holistic, thoughtful, play-oriented practices that allow children to construct knowledge through contextualized and purposeful experiences. In 2009 the Early Childhood Assembly was formed by a group of early childhood educators to provide a home at the National Council for Teacher of English for all who work with young children. Perspectives and Provocations in Early Childhood Education is a publication of the ECEA. The publication is intended to support teachers of young children and those interested in studying about early literacy by putting on offer texts with a strong emphasis on promoting thoughtful practices that enhance the teaching and learning of young children within and across diverse communities. All royalties from the book go to the ECEA to help the organization advance its goals of providing scholarships for early childhood teachers to participate in conferences and professional development events.

CONTENTS
Early Childhood Education Assembly Book Series. Acknowledgments. Introducing Perspectives and Provocations, Vivian Vasquez and Jeffrey Wood. Locating Themes and Trends of Early Childhood Education in Language Arts, Laurie Katz, Caitlin L. Ryan, Melissa I. Wilson, and Detra Price-Dennis. Negotiating Critical Literacies: Toward Full Inclusion in Early Childhood Classrooms, Mariana Souto-Manning and Carol Branigan Felderman. Recursos y Practicas Culturales: Reframing Writing as a Social Practice with Puerto Rican Children, Carmen L. Medina, María del Rocío Costa, and Nayda Soto. “How-To” Exercise Playful Power: Young Children Write Their Worlds, María Paula Ghiso. Learning from Artistic Encounters: A Teacher’s Experience with Young Children’s Paintings of Racial Bus Segregation, Candace R. Kuby. Transactional Literary Theory in a Diverse School Setting: An Examination of Book-Making with First Graders in a Pre-Service Teacher Education Literacy Course, Erin T. Miller. Playing Star Wars under the (Teacher’s) Radar: Detecting Kindergartners’ Action Texts and Embodied Literacies, Karen Wohlwend. Appendix: Perspectives and Provocations: Elephants.